Hello! I am vegan and I like saving money. I know veganism can be expensive and even a little daunting when you first look into it, so I aim to find deals and savings for products and places that offer vegan options! I will mainly look at 'vegan' things like plant milks, with some accidentally vegan items.
I will go by The Vegan Society's definition of vegan, including products with palm oil and parent companies. If you don't want to buy these, fair enough :-) https://twitter.com/VeganMagpie

Tuesday, 26 December 2017

Hello! I decided it might be easier to combine all the sales that come after Christmas into one handy post. I'll put at the top which companies feature so you know if you want to have a read or not. Don't forget, only buy things you definitely want or need! :-)

Ethcs
I've put this at the top as a lot below have now expired. The ethical clothing company Ethcs (who donate to Hugletts animal sanctuary and recently were able to get them a new turkey house!) are having a sale on their products for January/Veganuary. Just use the code VGANGUARY (note the spelling) to get 10% off your order! They always offer FREE SHIPPING! Just head here: https://ethcs.com/collections/all.

Lush
Lush usually do a Boxing Day sale online. However they aren't this year. But they are doing one in stores until stock runs out. This will include festive products and those made before October 2017 (excluding items such as white and black label perfumes). So if you were hoping to bag a bargain with Lush, head to your nearest store! Be warned though, big queues are likely.

White Rabbit Skincare
If you're looking for an independent online store who does top quality skincare products, White Rabbit Skincare have an offer on for Boxing day Only where you can get a very nice 35% off your order by using the code 'MERRY35'. Lovely! Just head here: https://whiterabbitskincare.co.uk/

All Glamour No Guts
Vegan apparel company All Glamour No Guts are offering free shipping WORLDWIDE! If you spend over £15, using the code 'MERRYCHRISTMAS'. This is available until 11:59pm 31/12/2017. Just head here:www.allglamournoguts.co.uk

Holland and Barrett

Holland and Barrett are offering £10 off when you spend £50 or more online and in store Boxing Day Only which comes off automatically at the checkout. They are also running their penny sale on some items until 23rd January 2018. This includes Eat Real chips and Goody Good Stuff.

Vegan Rex
Vegan apparel company vegan Rex have up to 75% off selected items! Just head here: https://www.veganrex.com/ I can't currently find an end date for this, so if you like something, I suggest you buy it. Please bare in mind that shipping costs £6.50, or free if over £150.

Kat Von D at Debenhams
As part of their sale, Debenhams have a few items from the Kat Von D range with 30-41% off. Just click here to get to the products on offer. Includes lip liners and 'studded kiss' lipstick.

EDEN perfumes
The super popular Eden perfumes are having a sale! You can get 15% off online with the code 'XMAS2017'. Very nice! Just head here: https://www.edenperfumes.co.uk/ This is until the 1st January. Very nice!

Wednesday, 20 December 2017

Hello! Not only do Tesco have their festive 5 offer on, but now Aldi also have a super 6 Christmas veg offer! The veg included is:

Brussel sprouts 500g bag for 19p

Carrots 1kg bag 19p

Parsnips 600g bag 19p

Broccoli 19p

Maris Piper 2.5kg bag 28p

Swede 28p

This offer is available from today (20th) until the 31st December. Good for New Year too then! There is different veg available that may suit you better than Tesco, plus you may be a regular shopper of Aldi so this offer will help more! Plus saving lots of 10 pences builds up!

Sunday, 17 December 2017

Hello! I'm seeing lots of people asking about mince pies, so in case you didn't know, Asda have officially marked their mince pies vegan! They in the packaging below. What's better is they are currently on offer at 2 for £1.50! Bonus!

Just to point out, for some reason a few people have found boxes which only say vegetarian. I don't yet know why this is. So if you can, best to get the ones marked vegan!

Wednesday, 13 December 2017

Hello! Tesco have put some very handy vegetables on a pretty great offer! I believe it's called the 'festive five' and if it isn't it should be! It includes bags of potatoes, carrots, parsnips, sprouts and a cauliflower, all for just 29p each!

All of these feature in my Christmas Dinner for under £10 post (here) making this even cheaper!

These offers are until boxing day, 26th December.

To confirm, it's a 1kg bag of carrots, a 2.5kg bag of potatoes, 500g bag of parsnips and a 500g bag of sprouts (plus the single cauliflower). This saves an extra £2.96!

Sunday, 10 December 2017

Hello! Ocado have a lot of offers which may be useful over the festive season! Below is a little selection where there are a good few items on the offer, plus there is a link at the bottom to all 'vegan' offers on Ocado.

First, Fry's have launched a new 'chilled' range which features a pasty, pies, and their strips in a chilled state. These are now available in Ocado with 20% off until 26th December. You only have to order by this date to get the offer. All offers below end on the 26th!

They also have a third off Fry's soy and quinoa country roast (good for Christmas day?), nuggets and sausages rolls.

Linda McCartney foods are also on offer on any 2 for £3 including sausages, burgers and country pies.

Coconut collaborative have offers of their yoghurts (2 for £3) and frozen products (2 for £8).

There's lots more smaller selections on offer too at Ocado at the moment (such as Alpro go on, a range of milks, Vivera foods) so to save this being the worlds longest post, click here for everything on offer under the 'vegan' search: Ocado offers

Don't forget to check places such as vouchercodes to see if there are any money saving vouchers you can use! Also don't forget there may be a delivery charge and the minimum order is £40.

Hello! Holland and Barrett are currently running their 'Buy One Get One Half Price' offer on a range of items until 20th December!

This includes items such as Ten Acre crisps, Booja Booja (which has some items in buy one get one half price, as well as others in a smaller 'better than half price' offer), orgran egg replacer, nooch and goody good stuff! (There's so much in it this time, it's worth just typing in your favourite brands as it seems everything is on some sort of offer!)

Not only this, but if you spend £40, you can also get £5 off until midnight tomorrow! The T and Cs also say that £5 will come off every £40 spent in one transaction up to £480, which is nice. So if you go mad and spend £80, you'll save £10 etc.

These offers are online and in store, however be aware that you pay postage online for orders under £20.

Saturday, 9 December 2017

Hello! Merchant Gourmet whole chestnuts are on offer in Tesco for just £1 (usually £2.25)! They're labelled vegan too, which is what I'd expect from a chestnut, but these days it's always nice to have it confirmed (I'm looking at you milky pickled onions!) These are on offer until 26th December.

This is great for Christmas, however I love these chestnuts and have many uses for them, which may give you ideas too! These include:

With sprouts, cooked in buttery spread

In a mushroom pate (using mushrooms, chestnuts, onions, garlic and herb cream sheese, a little plant milk to make it pate-like

2018 edit: I've just scanned through the veg prices and most seem to be axactly the same, however currently, loose parsnips and the bag of potatoes are actually cheaper! (17p a parsnip roughly and £1.09 for a bag of potatoes).

Hello! Christmas is an expensive time, but equally we want to enjoy the time we have with our loved ones! I'm seeing lots of people posting about Christmas dinner at the moment, so I thought I'd share my little tips and finds which may help make a delicious meal on a budget (whilst hopefully being easy too! Who wants to cook all day?! Well, me sometimes, but only to then partake in the eating!) I'm trying to stick to one shop for ease, I dislike it when things like this make you go to 1000 shops for one meal! I haven't factored in staples of salt, pepper or oil.

The Veg!
Thought I'd start with the basics. Veg! The simplest advice I have is to only buy what you need. By this, I mean don't be lured in by the big bags of veg, like carrots, unless you actually use them all the time. The bags can occasionally seem cheaper, for example whenever I buy a single courgette, it ends up cheaper to buy a pack of three. However more often than not just buying the individual (or wonky) veg is cheaper. You can buy lots of veg loose such as carrots, parsnips, onions, sprouts and potatoes. For example, Tesco online suggest carrots are 6p each (so a family of 4 it'd be 24p), Parsnips are 20p each (say 60p for a family of 4) brown onions are 16p each (64p for a baked onion each), sprouts are alarmingly priced per sprout at 4p...(so let's say 6 sprouts on a plate each, 96p), potatoes are 33p each (say a potato each for roasties, so £1.32. In this instance it may be worth getting a £1.35 2.5kg bag). You could always just roast the onions, carrots and parsnips together, they just need a drizzle of oil.

So for veg I've estimated £3.79. If you add a cauliflower for £1 it's £4.60. If you like peas, add 80p for value frozen peas. If you don't want so much onion, you could fry the peas with one onion to make them tasty!

Sauces!
Sauces are always nice for a roast and the following are vegan: Tesco free from cheese sauce packet mix at 59p (salt and pepper makes this pretty good I think!), Colman's bread sauce mix for 80p, Tesco own brand gravy granules for 70p (the vegetable and onion flavours are on their vegan list). You'll need plant milk for the cheese and bread sauce, value soya works fine at 59p.

Extras!

Stuffing mixes are often vegan, including Tesco own brand sage and onion stuffing mix 170g for 40p. This is a nice little side to add a different flavour to your meal.

There are a lot of roasts available this year, such as nut roasts and Linda McCartney roasts at £3.50, as well as currently an offer on a bag of cooked chestnuts for £1 to make your sprouts a bit more fancy, depending on what your budget will allow!

I'm not really writing this to follow step by step, however it's to just gives little ideas to either add something that's not too pricey (like a little cheese sauce!) or ways to cut costs (like using a stuffing mix for a nice flavoursome extra).

Little tip!
Holland and Barrett have lots of vegan roast items, such as VBites 'gammon style', Frys celebration roasts and Tofurky roasts! These are usually quite expensive, but I have seen a fair few reduced due to a short shelf life (literally selling for pence). These can be frozen ready for Christmas day, so I recommend popping into your local H&B whenever you walk past just to see what may be available at a large reduction.

Other ideas for future Christmas
Usually Christmas bits such as napkins and crackers are heavily reduced in January, so it may be worth buying some this January ready for next year. This should save you a good few pounds and you'll still get the alarmingly small photo frame and playing cards next year!

Hello! Earlier in the week I said I was planning a post about M and S Alcoholic drinks, here it is! Whilst M and S are perhaps not the best shop for vegan food...they are really awesome at marking their alcoholic drinks! They mark it either by the purple v on the front, or by writing 'suitable for vegetarians and vegans' on the back. These labels seems to be mainly on new drinks, so there may be older bottles that are still worth checking to see if they're vegan (like the fizzes etc).

These are to show the logos and labels to look out for!

Now for the exciting part. They have recently released a creme brulee liqueur and even more recently a chocolate coconut drink! I am drinking the coconut one as I type this *hic* and IT'S JUST HOW I REMEMBER BAILEYS!! Both of these drinks are on an offer too! They are £12 each, or 2 for £16!!

I couldn't see a date for when this offer ends, so I suggest getting some sooner rather than later if you want them! It possibly says 1st January, but I can't confirm it yet. I'll edit this when I can.

Also (not on offer) was a whole range of delicious sounding drinks, including 'melt in the mouth' chocolate liqueur, clementine and ginger liqueur, pineapple and lime daiquiri, blood orange negroni and a Christmas cobbler cocktail to name just a few. All labelled!

Friday, 1 December 2017

Hello! Now that we've had the first day of December, I have seen that a fair few vegan brands appear to be offering either a competition a day or an offer a day for advent (24 days) or for 12 days of Christmas. I won't be able to find them all, but I recommend if you have preferred brands, check out their social media to see if they're promoting anything. As an example I've found the following:

Vegan tuck box on instagram have an offer a a day

White rabbit skincare also have an offer a day on social media

Vegan life magazine have a competition a day which they advertise on social media (here is the link for today, 2nd December https://www.veganlifemag.com/advent-day-2-blackberry-cottage/)

This is just three as an example, but this could be a good way to save on a purchase you already want, or have a little fun and win something lovely! It's not just for vegan items either, this is common for many companies to do at this time of year!